What is the difference in emphasis between the terms science fiction and speculative fiction? Which is The Man in the High Castle?
Speculative fiction encompasses such branches of fiction as horror, fantasy, science fiction and the like – stories that can be “speculated” and not taken as certain fact. Science fiction is a genre under this umbrella which focuses on ideas that could be plausible relating to science. Often these stories contain elements of the supernatural and take place in the future, for this is the time when our imaginings may come to fruition. Underneath the label sci-fi are many more sub-genres such as cyberpunk and alternate history.
The Man In the High Castle is a short story by Philip K Dick. It takes place in an alternate time, where the Nazi’s and Japanese had been successful in World War Two and have consequently invaded separate halves of the United States (and the world political map is very different). There are no elements that usually appear in sci-fi such as aliens or time travel but nonetheless, the story is concerned with illusions. There are a number of key characters (quite a lot for such a short story) and one of the largest ideas at play is the concept of the story within the story - The Grasshopper Lies Heavy, which postulates an entirely different version of history. By using two false realities, the conclusion can be reached that one being false and one being true proves the existance of further realities. This is summed up by author Charles Platt "All of his work starts with the basic assumption that there cannot be one, single, objective reality. Everything is a matter of perception. The ground is liable to shift under your feet. A protagonist may find himself living out another person's dream, or he may enter a drug-induced state that actually makes better sense than the real world, or he may cross into a different universe completely."[
Which brings us to wonder: is this story classed as science fiction or speculative fiction? It contains no typical sci-fi inclusions however it toys with concepts of time and reality, and brings in practices such as the I-Ching. Speculative Fiction is a very broad term, and yes, this book does fall under this category. I myself would label it as the best example of Alternate History, merging Science Fiction with elements from Speculative Fiction.
REFERENCES:
Brown, E. (2001). Introduction. In Dick, P.K., The Man in the High Castle (p.v-xii). London: Penguin.
Dick, P.K. (2001; 1962). The Man in the High Castle. London: Penguin.
Yes, you are quite right in defining which categories com in the umbrella of speculative fictions and which in that of science fictions. But, nevertheless, they are broadly termed as fictions, make-up stories to induce us to believe what we read can become real in the future.
ReplyDeleteThe Man in the High Castle describes, as you said, is a group of people, “a number of key characters”, living in separate halves of the United States occupied by Nazi and Japanese. Of course, this is not true in real life. So it can be classified broadly in the category of speculative fiction. I hope I could make myself clear on the distinguishing the difference between speculative and science fictions.